GMC truck commercial. Listen to the voiceover. It’s Gob! Lamisil commercial. It’s also Gob! And here’s one more: Don’t trailer (Grindhouse in-movie, not sure if he’s actually done real trailers). I searched and I guess it’s sort of common knowledge that Will Arnett used to do voiceover work for commercials, but it’s new to me. Learned about this listening to an old Adam Carolla radio show clip. Adam Carolla has a few voiceover ideas that Will performs, including “This week on Hack. To catch an international jewel thief, Hack is going to have to become… a rapist.”

I sort of realized that only a handful of people are on Facebook clicking my profile. And they’re probably in this video. So I’m posting it here to share. Right now Facebook seems to be a decent choice for uploading HD videos. Vimeo only allows one upload per week and it’s capped at 500 MB. Pro only gets you up to 2000 MB. I say “only” because the pro upgrade in Flickr takes you from 200 pictures to unlimited. But me complaining about free services isn’t exactly the most engaging topic, so here are some clip-by-clip notes about the video:

• Wally’s playing the piano in one of the California State University: San Marcos studios.
• Fork in the road to I-15 South.
• Wally shooting me shooting him. We sort of planned to do this for a while and in the original audio I say something like, “This isn’t as cool as I thought it’d be.”
• Karaoke spot. Don’t pick “Making Love Out of Nothing at All” as your song if you’re not prepared to say “Making love out of nothing at all” for the final two minutes of a six minute song. A bonus that night was some random white guy screaming “Mabuhay Tigers ‘79!” at our group over and over.
• Daisuke, my favorite sushi chef. Sushi Diner, not shabby at all. In fact, it’s fantastic.
• I don’t know why I put this shot of the McDonald’s cup in here. There are a lot of two-second clips that are better than that. For instance, I was sort of focused on my camera shooting a Jack in the Box cube. It took me a while to realize that it was in front of apparently the biggest Jack in the Box ever. I asked the other guys why it was so huge and Wally says, “It’s the Jack in the Box where dreams become realities.”
• “I might be on vacation but the jumper doesn’t take a day off.” I was like 2 for 15 during this.
• Laura invited us to watch her group sing for the CSU:SM president. We were outside playing basketball beforehand (see above bullet) and basically everyone we saw walk into the building was in slacks and a tie or a dress. We had hoodies. So we were a little hesitant to go in.
• Wally eating noodles at Chopstix. Jason and Curt live a couple minutes away from what an Asian district. There are probably a few dozen restaurants packed into a couple blocks with a few dozen parking spots. Parking can get a little hairy, but it’s worth it.
• Jason ordering breakfast at Spice Diner. Not sure what’s with the name. It’s good, but the guys described it as twice as good as Denny’s. Isn’t that like saying someone’s twice as good as Brian Scalabrine?
• Jason playing the guitar.
• Wally playing DS.
• Me shaving Wally’s head.
• Jason fake-guitaring and Curt fake-pretend-guitaring.
• Jason hooked his iPhone to the car’s auxiliary connection so that we could listen to some songs he had on it, but then he has the sudden urge to demonstrate an app to us.

It’s Friday night and there’s nothing planned. And I couldn’t be happier. I’m exhausted. Instead, I’m going to write five top five 2008 lists for the five days before the new year. Most of it is fairly predictable, and all of it is skewed toward probably the last four months. I haven’t really thought of what the other four lists are going to be about, but the first one is my five favorite movies that were released this year.

5. THE ORPHANAGE

Horror movies rarely actually scare you these days. The Orphanage is really creepy. The jump scenes aren’t plentiful, but they’re effective. And the final sequence builds anticipation perfectly. It’s as uncomfortable as the scene in Zodiac where Jake Gylenhaal is in the basement looking at movie posters with the creepy neighbor.

4. FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL

Every time I think of good comedies this year I think of Tropic Thunder and Pineapple Express and somehow forget about Forgetting Sarah Marshall. I watched it sort of late, after everyone said “watch it, it’s really good.” If you haven’t seen it, watch it, it’s really good.

3. TROPIC THUNDER

I was fired up for this movie since the first trailer came out. Robert Downey Jr. playing a white guy playing a black guy? And a giant budget? Count me in. I watched this at a theater in Berkeley and I already thought it was kind of quirky because it plays a retro movie every week. Then Tropic Thunder opened with the advertisement for Booty Sweat and ‘quirky’ became a major understatement. Halfway into the next trailer I realized it was fake and hope I wasn’t the only idiot that didn’t know. Tropic Thunder lived up to my expectations, which were pretty high. Dan showed me the menu for the Blu-Ray (and I assume it’s the same for the DVD) — it’s awesome.

2. PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

That Hills parody from last year made me a giant fan of the comedic stylings of James Franco. The ‘How to Act’ shorts really sealed the deal. I went and watched Freaks and Geeks in a couple of weeks, then I yearned for more. And nothing came for a while after that. Then the Pineapple Express trailer came out and I marked my calendar for that.

When I got a copy, I pretty much shoved it down my brother and my friends’ throats. And I can’t say I regret it. There are a few parts that I skip on re-watches, but the first scene with Franco and Seth Rogen doesn’t get old to me. Definitely my favorite comedy since Superbad.

1. THE DARK KNIGHT

No surprise here. Everyone’s seen it. I don’t have much to add about the movie itself. Perfect performances. Midnight showing made it an (awesome, awesome) event. The audience was a bunch of college kids, which I was starting to miss because I was right in the midst of the “Ces in the Real World” experiment. One of the better days of the year, in part because I got to watch Jurassic Park on the big screen again (same quirky theater) before getting in line for The Dark Knight. Can’t ask for much more than that.

MOVIE I HATED: THE MUMMY 3

Slept through the middle — food coma’d from my birthday dinner with the roommates. I tried really hard to stay awake because I didn’t want to disrespect my roommates like that. But The Mummy 3 really did the trick. I didn’t think I missed all that much, then I talked to Wally about it (one of the other 13 people who actually saw it), and he told me, yeah, I didn’t miss much. I actually enjoyed the first and second films in the series. I remember me and Russ ditching a bunch of our friends to watch The Mummy II and not regretting it a bit. Now that I think harder, I remembered that they watched Driven, starring Sylvester Stallone. So the not-regretting-it might be more about what we missed than what we saw. Either way, it’s easily the worst in the series. And probably the worst third film in any series.

But Dan got me a MacBook for Christmas.¬† I know what you’re gonna say (Sarah): spoiled. I know, and I am. Goodbye Linux!¬† Thanks Dan.¬† And while there’s still half an hour left in the Pacific Time Zone: Merry Christmas! I’ll leave you with a picture of my cousins during present pass out, which takes an hour or more and means we don’t open gifts until past 5pm, but is still my favorite family tradition:

Just thought I’d share a few thoughts on the Golden Globe nominations.

• I like to think that I’m pretty well-watched when it comes to movies, but every year when nominations for awards come out, it reminds me that I’m not.¬† I haven’t seen any of this year’s best motion picture: drama nominees.
• Continuing on that, I haven’t seen any of the movies involving any of the Best Actor – Drama or Best Actress – Drama nominees.
• Wow, and I haven’t seen any of Best Motion Picture: Comedy or Musical¬† nominees either.
• …or the Best Actress – Comedy nominees.
• James Franco got nominated for Best Actor: Comedy or Musical for Pineapple Express.¬† Basically my second favorite movie this year behind The Dark Knight.
• Here are the nominees for Best Actor in a Supporting Role: Comedy or Musical.¬† I haven’t seen The Duchess or Doubt, but I’m guessing Philip Seymour Hoffman did his thing.¬† If Heath Ledger’s a lock for the Oscars (I haven’t been paying attention since summer, when there was a lot of buzz for him to get nominated for leading role, so I have no idea either way), then I can see Robert Downey Jr. winning this, the same way Johnny Depp won a Golden Globe for Pirates of the Caribbean on a pretty stacked year.¬† Except I just Googled it and it was a Screen Actor’s Guild award, not a Golden Globe, so scratch this entire paragraph.¬† Give it to Heath Ledger!

a. TOM CRUISE – TROPIC THUNDER
b. ROBERT DOWNEY JR. –TROPIC THUNDER
c. RALPH FIENNES – THE DUCHESS
d. PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN – DOUBT
e. HEATH LEDGER – THE DARK KNIGHT

• More sets of movies I haven’t seen: Best Director, Best Original Screenplay.
• Rooting for Mad Men for Best Television Series – Drama, Best Actress, and Best Actor (Jon Hamm is a lock!¬† Trust me, because I haven’t seen any of those other shows.)
• I like em both a lot, but I’d pick Alec Baldwin for 30 Rock over Steve Carell.

Darko goes off after a European basketball championships game. Subtitled (I’m guessing fairly accurately, because he was fined at the time) and priceless. It’s from 2007, but today’s the first time I’ve seen it.

Script for The Dark Knight (PDF):

The Joker gets a switchblade in Gambol’s mouth- SHARP METAL
PULLING THE CHEEK TAUT. The Bounty Hunters subdue the
remaining bodyguards.

THE JOKER

Wanna know how I got these scars? My
father was a drinker and a fiend.
He’d beat mommy right in front of me.
One night he goes off crazier than
usual, mommy gets the kitchen knife
to defend herself. He doesn’t like
that. Not. One. Bit.

The Joker TUGS Gambols cheek with the blade.

THE JOKER

So, me watching, he takes the knife
to her, laughing while he does it.
Turns to me and says ‘why so
serious?’ Comes at me with the knife-
‘why so serious?’ Sticks the blade
in my mouth- ‘Let’s put a smile on
that face’ and…

The Joker looks up at the ASHEN FACES of the remaining Body
Guards. Smiles.

THE JOKER

Why so serious?

The script is from the Warner Brothers “For Your Consideration” site. You can listen to the score also. Goosebump city.

Probably the 5th time I’ve posted this, but It’s Jimmy V week.

I know, I gotta go, I gotta go, and I got one last thing and I said it before, and I want to say it again. Cancer can take away all my physical abilities. It cannot touch my mind, it cannot touch my heart and it cannot touch my soul. And those three things are going to carry on forever.